1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of carpet cleaning apparatus and more particularly to water/cleaning solution vacuum carpet cleaning apparatus, principally of the large, commercial or industrial type, and still more particularly to waste water and cleaning solution-air separation vessels used in such carpet cleaning apparatus.
2. Background Discussion
Although most homeowners and apartment dwellers are familiar with small, hand carried carpet cleaning apparatus of the type commonly rented at supermarkets and hardware stores, they are unfamiliar with large commercial or industrial carpet cleaners. Such large, commercial or industrial carpet cleaning apparatus, which employ high pressure water and carpet cleaning solutions, are commonly used to clean large expanses of carpets, for example, in office buildings, and common areas of hotels and conference centers where carpets are subject to a large amount of heavy foot traffic and which are subject to spilled food and drinks.
These large commercial or industrial types of carpet cleaners are typically built into trucks or towable trailers which permit carpets to be cleaned on site. Various United States patents disclose different aspects of large commercial or industrial types of carpet cleaning apparatus. For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,443,909 to J.D. Cameron; 4,475,264 to R. R. Schultz; 3,341,081 to W. L. King; 4,158,248 to M. C. Palmer; 4,109,340 to L. E. Bates; 4,154,578 and 4,244,079 to W. F. Bane; 4,191,590 to J. J. Sundheim; 4,207,649 to J. A. Bates; 4,267,618 to J. F. Cuscovitch; 4,264,826 to W. UIImann; and 4,284,127 to S. W. Collier et al disclose large, commercial-type mobile carpet cleaning apparatus which are vehicle mounted. In contrast, U.S. Pat. No. 4,182,001 to H. W. Krause discloses a smaller carpet cleaning apparatus that is non-vehicle mounted but which is still larger than the typical light duty carpet cleaners commonly rented in stores.
All of such disclosed carpet cleaning apparatus have various advantages as well as certain disadvantages. So far as is known to the present inventor, all such carpet cleaning apparatus are relatively inefficient because of the type of waste water and cleaning solution-air separation tanks or vessels used. Such separation tanks are connected to the implement--typically an elongate, hand operated cleaning wand--used for contacting a carpet being cleaned. Below ambient pressure applied to the separation tank suctions dirty, used water or a mixture of dirty water and cleaning solution along with air from the cleaning wand into the separation tank wherein the dirty liquid is separated from the air and is pumped, for example, to a holding tank associated with the carpet cleaning apparatus or to a suitable drain connection where the carpets are being cleaned.
Because such waste liquid-air separation tanks have heretofore, to Applicant's knowledge, been constructed with relatively large separation regions, considerable power has been required to provide the necessary vacuum pressure to quickly and effectively remove dirty waste liquid from the carper being cleaned. This large amount of power required to provide a vacuum increases the size of the equipment needed and/or decreases the cleaning efficiency--that is, the carpet cleaning rate of the quality of the cleaning operation.
For this and other reasons, the present Applicant has invented an improved carpet cleaning apparatus employing a highly efficient air-dirty waste liquid separation tank.